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Histories: Get up, get out of bed

By Richard Lovett

Thirty-nine years ago, Gregg Hill took the world’s laziest summer job. First he was poked, prodded and had his fitness assessed by every technique then known to medicine. Then, for 20 days, he and four other student volunteers became the ultimate couch potatoes, confined to bed – not even allowed to walk to the toilet. The goal was to investigate how astronauts would respond to space flight, but when Hill and his fellows finally staggered to their feet, their drastic deterioration helped spark a revolution in medical care here on Earth. Before 1966, bed rest was recommended for people with weak hearts. Now doctors knew that it made them worse. And Hill’s work isn’t over. Next year, he’ll be back in the lab, helping another generation of scientists learn the secrets of how to age gracefully.

THE five men in the publicity photo are the image of American youth, circa 1966&colon; well groomed, smiling, confident. America was racing for the moon, but these young men were looking beyond, doing their bit for astronauts in orbiting space stations and perhaps eventually a trip to Mars.

They had volunteered for what is now known as the Dallas Bed Rest and Training Study. The goals were twofold&colon; to simulate the effects of weightlessness on astronauts and to determine how quickly the body recovered when normal life resumed. As an aside, the scientists who were monitoring the effects of such slothfulness hoped to find out why hospital patients feel as weak as kittens after lengthy stays in bed. Speculation at the time focused on extended inactivity causing blood to pool in the …